How to handle an Irish cheque in EU country

A collegue of mine has left Ireland and returned to Italy. She is due a refund from her insurance company who have said they'll post a cheque to her. The problem is that she has closed her Irish bank account and as far as I know, it will not be possible to cash/lodge an Irish cheque in an Italian bank, at least according to the howbankingworks web site (sorry I can't post a link here)

So my question is twofold

1. Assuming that the insurance company go ahead and issue the cheque, is there any way for the beneficiary to get the funds?

2. Is a customer obliged to accept payment by cheque or can they insist on some other mechanism such as SEPA funds transfer

Thanks,
Phil

Insurance companies in Ireland are still stuck in the last century with their cheques.

There is no reason why they can't do a SEPA transfer. An Italian bank may be able to process the cheque but it may take a month to get clearance of the funds.

Supply the insurance company with her Italian bank account IBAN code and tell the insurance company to transfer funds using it.

She may also have to pay a fee for lodging a foreign cheque. I don't even bother trying here in Germany anymore - had a couple of similar cheques when I first moved here but it was costing something like €20 just to lodge them (if I recall correctly that was a cheque for around €2,000. I don't remember if it was a fixed charge or changed depending on the sum involved).

Thanks for your resonses. It might be resolved, the insurance company have said that they'll accept a phone call requesting that the cheque be made out to me and then I'll look after transferring it myself.

phildin said:

Thanks for your resonses. It might be resolved, the insurance company have said that they'll accept a phone call requesting that the cheque be made out to me and then I'll look after transferring it myself.

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That doesn't sound right. No way can this allowed. How much are we talking?

If the cheque is not crossed "ac payee only", she may be able to endorse it over to yourself and you can lodge it to your own account and then transfer the funds electronically once it has cleared

It was allowed, I got the cheque, it was for a little over €100. The original payment came from my credit card so that may have helped.